Martha’s Kids
In 1750, eighteen year old Martha Dandridge married Daniel Parke Custis, twice her age, and one of the wealthiest planters in Virginia. They had sincerely liked each other, and the marriage was happy for seven years.
Then Daniel died.
During those seven years, Martha and Daniel had four children. Daniel Parke Custis, Jr. and Frances Parke Custis both died as toddlers.
Little more than a year after Daniel’s death, she married George Washington. They had no children together.
The Step-Father
George Washington, colonel of the Virginia Militia and soon-to-be planter, was just shy of 27 when he he married the Widow Custis, mother of two young children.
John Parke Custis (Jack) and Martha Parke Custis (Patsy) were only four and two, and knew no other father than George Washington. They called him “Father.” He was happy to be guardian, and custodian of their large inheritance.
Washington was a conscientious parent, providing the children with the best of everything – whether it was education, health treatments or the accoutrements of wealthy life.
Always sensitive to his own lack of formal education, GW naturally wished to furnish those opportunities to his stepson. Once Jack was of schooling age, he sought the finest tutors available. Jack was warmhearted and affectionate, but a halfhearted and indifferent student. His tutors despaired. Jack routinely promised to acquit himself more diligently, but bottom line, he was no scholar. George despaired.
Patsy Custis was different. Young ladies were usually tutored at home by their mothers, and Martha was a superb example. But early in puberty, Patsy’s epileptic seizures appeared with growing frequency and intensity. Washington loved his stepdaughter and spared no expense in engaging the best doctors, sometimes from miles away, and trying every panacea that might prove helpful. But in the 1770s, treatments were unknown. Patsy died at seventeen. Martha was devastated. So was her stepfather.
The Marriage of Jack
When Jack was seventeen, he was being tutored in Annapolis, preparing to attend Kings College in New York (today’s Columbia University). He had absolutely no interest or acumen for college, but his ever-hopeful stepfather insisted it was in his best interest. Meanwhile, Jack met 15-year-old Eleanor (Nelly) Calvert, and the two youngsters fell in love. In the 1770s, 15 and 17 were still considered “too young,” but 16 and 18 were considered young, but marriageable.
George Washington had met and liked the Calverts. He was charmed by Nelly, and tentatively agreed to their “courtship,” pending a) that Jack try Kings College and give it a chance; and b) that Nelly come to Mount Vernon and meet Mrs. W.
Jack went to New York, hated it, and lasted one semester. Nelly went to Mt. Vernon, loved it and charmed Martha. She also bonded affectionately with Patsy only days before her death. Nelly’s warm devotion to the grieving mother endeared her, and a grudging agreement from both families (because of their youth) led to their marriage in early 1774.
Hopeful that marriage and “responsibilities” would help mature his immature stepson, George Washington released a portion of his Custis inheritance to young Jack. The newlyweds moved into the old Custis “White House” in New Kent Country – about 100 miles from Mt. Vernon.
Jack, Father of Girls…..
In 1775, shortly after George Washington had been named General of the Continental Army and dispatched to Boston, Nelly and Jack gave birth to an unnamed daughter, who died shortly after birth.
Then with annual regularity, came Elizabeth “Eliza” Parke Custis, Martha “Patsy” Parke Custis, and Eleanor “Nelly” Parke Custis.
In 1780, Nelly gave birth to unnamed twin girls, who lived only three weeks.
Then finally, Jack and Nelly had their seventh child: a son, named George Washington (Wash) Parke Custis, born in April, 1781.
Between his responsibilities as husband and father, and dutiful son to a doting mother, Jack Custis was persuaded not to enlist in the Continental Army. His stepfather believed that at twenty, he was still needed more at home.
Jack-in-the-Army
In mid-1775, now-General Washington was sent to Massachusetts to “make” an Army. When he urged his wife Martha to come for “winter quarters,” he knew it would be hard on her. Jack and Nelly had recently lost their first born, and were staying at Mount Vernon with Martha. They were glad to accompany Mrs. W. on her journey. With her son and daughter-in-law as escorts on a trip that took several weeks, it was a comfort to all – especially to General Washington.
For most of the Revolutionary War years, Jack devoted his time and efforts to his beloved Nelly (thus the seven children in quick succession), his newly acquired plantation less than 20 miles from Mt. Vernon, and services in the House of Burgesses. For his stepfather, having Jack near Martha was one less care on his plate.
But in 1781, British troops had planted themselves firmly in the South, working their way into Virginia. Even though Jack Custis was still a sitting member of the House of Burgesses, he desired to join the army. General Washington relented, and as a civilian, (some say observer, some say volunteer) Jack joined the American troops in Yorktown, where British General Charles Cornwallis was facing a much larger enemy than he had expected.
Jack was assigned as an aide to General Lafayette and finally, on September 28, 1781, Cornwallis formally surrendered, effectively ending the hostilities, although the war technically dragged on for two more years.
Ah, but the sad part…
At the time of the surrender, Jack Custis was ill. Whether it was typhoid or malaria or cholera, it was a common camp fever. He was taken to Eltham, the home of his uncle Burwell Bassett, widower of Martha’s sister Anna. Nelly Custis and Martha Washington had been summoned to his side. As Jack neared death, George Washington made a “flying trip” to be with the stepson he had raised since early childhood.
Jack Custis died on November 5. He was just shy of his 27th birthday. He left three small daughters and a 6-month old son.
Sources:
Bourne, Miriam Anne, First Family: George Washington and his Intimate Relations, W.W. Norton & Co., 1982
Fraser, Flora – The Washingtons: George and Martha “Join’d by Friendship, Crown’d by Love” – Alfred A. Knopf, 2015
Randall, Willard Sterne – George Washington: A Life – Galahad Books, 2006
https://www.battlefields.org/learn/biographies/john-parke-custis
https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/john-parke-custis/
Presidential History Blog 